Twice while driving my outback on good gravel roads, I've come across jeeps lying on their sides, on the outside edges of curves. I'm sure these folks were driving much faster than I would on such roads, but they apparently also had a poorer understanding of the limits of their vehicles (and physics).

MoapaPk wrote:Twice while driving my outback on good gravel roads, I've come across jeeps lying on their sides, on the outside edges of curves. I'm sure these folks were driving much faster than I would on such roads, but they apparently also had a poorer understanding of the limits of their vehicles (and physics).

+1

I have also seen many jeeps stuck in snow. The off road wrangler type love to show off their 4x4 even if they don't know anything about weight and traction!

Not on mine (2005) in almost three years I've owned it, but it rarely made sense since the spare is basically unused.

btw Did a little searching on subaruforester.org, and it sounds like Tire Rack now offers a tire shaving service on new tires bought from them. My guess is that I could probably find a local shop to shave a new tire if I wanted to start doing 5-wheel rotations.

Basically, you would have to rotate the spare through about each 3000 miles (or less -- see link above). For flats off paved roads, a full-sized spare still makes sense, since the slip on each wheel is likely to be large compared to the radius*2pi difference.

Scott wrote:Just got a new Outback (with the CVT transmission). We missed our Subaru too much after trading in our Forester back in 2007. Other vehicles we had/had just aren't the same in snow country.

Have you taken it on rough roads yet? Will a full-sized spare fit in the spare compartment?

It's rumored that the "new" transmission has the same sort of problems indicated for the CRV in the link above -- the limited-slip differential is gone.

The higher clearance and tougher shocks are interesting, but the take-off angle still looks annoying.

Not really rough, only a moderately rough gravel on the test drive. We did a test drive here, but bought the vehicle in SLC over the weekend.

For the really rough roads, we still have our old Pathfinder (which is only driven if we have to drive on really rough roads- we've been putting less than 1500 miles a year on it; this year will end up with less than 1000).

Will a full-sized spare fit in the spare compartment?

Yes, but you will have to remove the foam storage compartment insert.

You can still get the vehicle with a manual transmission, but we got the CVT for the gas mileage (which is significantly better with the CVT). So far we got 33 mpg on our only fill up to date (EPA is 22/29, but we almost never do any city driving).

Subies rock. I own two of them, at the opposite ends of the performance spectrum: A 1991 Loyale wagon (yep, it's slow on the uphill) and a 2005 WRX STi (not slow.) We love both of them. With good tires, they are amazing in snow.

Well Its already time for an oil change on my Subaru. I just got it in Oct. and already put 3,000 miles on it. Any suggestions on what oil and or filter to use? I haven't done any research yet, but whatever I use I want it to be consistent. I have a 2007 Subaru Outback.